Mega Trigger
by Moonraker One
Summary: Mega Man meets Chrono Trigger in this crossover. When a meteor destroys Wily's fortress, and a punk haired time traveller teams up with a blue bomber, who will win the day? ORIGINALLY TO BE PART OF A LARGER SERIES, NOW A ONESHOT


Mega Trigger

By Moonraker One

Author Notes: This story was originally submitted for placement as part of Miranda Paugh's _Mega Man – The Series_ fanfiction on her website. Thus, you may not understand the references to Mega Manhaving hadmagic at a previous point in time("Mega Magic" was one story in her series), or any other references to her works unless you go to mmhp dot net and read her works. I just didn't want this story to go unnoticed. Also, if you _do_ read her series, she refers to "Protoman" as "Break Man."Mega Man and all related characters are property of Capcom. All Chrono Trigger characters are property of Square-Enix. I know, in the Chrono Trigger game, Crono doesn't seem to have a last name, and Square never gave him one to my knowledge, so I'm making up a name.

CHAPTER ONE – All Time Is Relative

Nothing made Mega Man feel better than to have one, perfectly ordinary day without the presence of Doctor Wily's machinations. For the past week the devious doctor had not shown his face, which usually meant that there was a deep, dark secret being concocted within the walls of the gigantic fortress of steel and stone that sat just at the top of the hill, a few miles away from the city. All around him, Mega Man could see the seemingly endless rows of skyscrapers stretching from horizon to horizon as he trotted happily down the street. He didn't usually run the errands—that task went to Roll. This time was the exception, though, as she'd found herself targeted by a gang of unruly teenagers (for the second time ever) just outside the store. Mega Man didn't understand what the purpose was of Dr. Light needing some lighter fluid and a box of matches, but then again, it wasn't his normal self to question what his creator wanted. If it didn't involve anything illegal—which as he could remember, never happened—he always did tasks that were necessary. Since he was a genuine _living_ machine, he could choose whether to do it or not, and that made him happy when he thought of his free will.

He found himself caught in a mass of chaos during what happened next: a huge ball of fire streaked out of the mid-morning sky and swooped down, curving its trajectory as it streaked through the atmosphere. In the time it took Mega Man to twist his head to his left to see it hit, it straightened out, and to the pleasure of some, the horror to others, and the shock of everyone, slammed directly _into_ Dr. Wily's fortress, hurtling stone and metal in every direction as an enormous cloud of dust billowed from the spot where the hill had stood with fortress atop of it, just mere moments before. After it hit, time seemed to speed up, as people began rushing in every direction. The blue bomber cringed as he prepared for a shockwave equivalent to a magnitude ten earthquake to blast half the city into oblivion. When it didn't come, and the dust cloud settled rather slowly, he and those surrounding him looked around in surprise. The shockwave from the blast, Mega Man predicted, should have been powerful enough to crush cement into powder; instead, there had been nothing. He thought, desperately trying to think of a weapon that could create no shockwave after the initial blast, and affect such a small radius such as Wily's fortress. He snapped out of his thinking state—his immediate concern had to be the people frantically rushing about.

The government seemed to beat him to the punch. "Citizens of Megaland!" a voice cried through booming loudspeakers. "Do not panic! The meteor strike was an isolated incident! We have word from several prominent scientists such as Doctor Light, and others, informing us that no more are headed our way." The news seemed to calm down the people who were on edge. After the initial suddenness of the event was over, Mega Man instantly knew his next course of action: investigating the wreckage of the once huge fortress. He prepared his Mega Buster as he heard footsteps approaching him. Whirling around, he returned his arm to its normal state.

"Whew, Protoman!" he cried. "You scared me for a minute there!" Protoman looked to the former hill, then to his brother, and let out a mild chuckle.

"I think I like mother nature's remodeling job with Wily's castle," he joked. Mega Man rolled his eyes. This was not a time for humor.

"C'mon Protoman!" was the response from the blue bomber. "Wily's a Human being. As evil as he is, we have to check the wreckage and see if everything's ok." Not wanting to push a pointless argument, Protoman followed his brother towards the giant crater.

"Can't take a joke," he mumbled. They walked on for several minutes towards the crater when all of a sudden, a swirling mass of blue color emerged out of nowhere. Rapidly, it shaped itself into the shape of a sphere, and had various shades of the color blue oscillating inside of it, until it then vanished into nothingness, leaving behind a rather odd-looking individual. "Who're you?" inquired Protoman, beating his brother to the punch.

The stranger looked to his left and right. "Who're you?" was his equal response.

CHAPTER TWO – Meet the Time Traveler(s)

Neither of the duo of Mega Man and Protoman surrendered their calm authoritative position. "I want to know who you are," Mega Man insisted. "Have to make sure you aren't a servant of Wily's." The stranger squinted, raised an eyebrow, and looked to his left and right; all signs he was confused by their question. He had his right hand on his sword, sheathed at his left hip.

"Who the heck is this 'Wylee' character?" he exclaimed. Mega Man estimated, by the pitch of the person's voice, that he was about eighteen years old. The kid had spiky reddish-orange punk-style hair, a headband on his forehead that was white, a blue tunic on top of a green undershirt, and a pair of hiking boots that looked like they could trek across the entire of Megaland and not take a lot of wear. From the look in his eyes, and the location of his right hand, he did not trust the sight in front of him more than chickens trust a fox. "I've never heard of a 'Wylee,' now my turn to ask you: Do you serve Lavos?"

"Lavas? Don't those come from volcanoes?" Mega Man couldn't help but chuckle at the statement made by his brother, but Protoman genuinely didn't intend his response to be a joke.

"Don't be dumb with me," the kid hastily cut them off. "Lavos. Big alien, lives in a living meteor he uses as a space ship, manipulates evolution to empower himself. LAVOS."

"Well, an asteroid," Protoman began to say.

"Meteor," his brother interrupted.

"Whatever. It just struck, causing that crater about five hundred feet behind you." The kid turned hastily, took a look at the crater, and almost tripping in the process, dashed towards it with all his speed. Once he stood at the edge, he looked down into the hole, and with disdain, clenched his fists.

"NO!" he shouted. "It can't be! He's dead! He's dead! _WE_ killed him! He can't be here!" Protoman slapped the kid.

"Get a grip on yourself! Now tell us what in the world you're talking about!" The kid shook his head after hearing the robot's request. Delving within his memory of the past, he turned to the two short machines.

"Me and some friends of mine, last year, killed off the evil known as Lavos. He had landed sixty-five million years ago and, using his magics, manipulated the very process of evolution for himself to undergo the evolutions intended for mankind in order to become the most powerful being. We thought we'd killed him but apparently…"

"Apparently _what!_" Protoman demanded. He could scarcely believe the story he was being fed by the young one. The kid shook his head, looking rather disdained.

"Some of his spawn must have escaped."

Crono felt something but a mere instant before it happened. He turned, merely to see if anything had been taken from the impact site, when the giant meteor emerged from the crater, devoid of damage. Part of it, with a mouth-like opening faced the trio. Mega Man and Protoman both drew their arm weapons to fire upon it, but the kid hastily turned at the sight of a ball of energy streaking out of the opening in the meteor. Before the brothers could even fire, the kid pushed them both out of the way. Unfortunately, he did so moments too late to fully shield himself. Thus, he threw up his arms in defense. Which, to the brothers' horror, turned out to be like blocking a cannon shot with cardboard. The teen took the blast head-on, which violently removed him from his standing position, and propelled him back at a seemingly impossible rate of speed, slamming him into—and then directly through—a series of four trees, where he landed face first in the grass.

"Are you alright!" shouted Mega Man, as he watched the meteor rapidly shoot itself back down into the hole and begin to burrow.

"eerrrrrhhh," was all the teen managed to utter. The young man had been blasted through four trees that had to at least be two feet in diameter, and he wasn't killed on impact. Mega Man was impressed.

Light streaming in from overhead seemed to creep into the line of sight of the young man, then it blew away the darkness as he opened his eyes. Once his vision's blurriness evaporated, he sprung up to a seated position, and jerked his head left and right, analyzing his surroundings. He recognized the two brothers who he'd saved from a blast from the Lavos spawn, but who was the old man and the little girl? He had little time to react, as his back and sides screamed out in pain.

"Hold up a minute now," the elderly-looking Dr. Light requested. "You're not exactly in prime condition." The young man looked with confusion at him.

"W…what happened?" asked the teen. "Oh, I'm sorry, I never introduced myself. I'm Crono Teoris." Light smiled and shook the teen's hand.

"Nice to meet you. I'm Thomas Xavier Light, and these are Mega Man, Protoman, and Roll. I've been wondering; are you a machine or something similar? Because if what Mega Man said to me is true, you got shot through not one but _four_ trees and you don't have a single broken bone." Crono shook his head.

"No, I'm no machine, but I'm guessing these two are?"

"Three, actually; Roll is an android as well. How did you survive that strike, exactly? You did go straight through solid wood, correct?"

"I used my magic to put…"

Mega Man cut him short. "I'm sorry for interrupting you, but you said you used _magic_…?" The blue robot vividly—almost shamefully—recalled his escapades regarding the forces of magic. The thought that this kid, who definitely was a living _human_ being, could utilize anything similar to the Powers he had to endure, was amazing.

Crono shot a confused look at the blue bomber. "Yeah. I'm a time traveler; if you go to the end of time, the Master of War, Spekkio, might give you magic, depending on several things. Like I was saying, I put up an invisible shield of magical energy to cushion myself. I knew the majority of damage would come not from the trees, but from the blast, so I put a lot more on my arms than my back. _Now_ I'm wishing I'd equalized it more." He rubbed his back in pain. Suddenly, he perked up as if he remembered something. Thinking, he reached into his pouch at his side and pulled out a potion, and drank it down. Immediately, bruises on his left and right forearms disappeared, and his overall mood seemed to improve. "Mid and Max Potions," he quipped, grinning. "Never leave Guardia Kingdom without 'em."

"Guardia?" Roll inquired, curiously. "Is that where you're from?"

"That's _where_, _when_ is the year one-thousand one." As he finished the alarm went off. Protoman beat Mega Man to the monitor, for he happened to be standing closer to it. Protoman whipped his head around to face Dr. Light.

"Two people trying to get in!" he shouted. "One, a purple-haired girl who appears to be wearing a scientist's magnifying vision helmet," he remembered the goofy-looking contraption Light sometimes used when he needed a magnifying glass or two available at immediate request, "and a blonde-haired girl with a pendant. Should I go out and take a look?"

"Yeah," Light agreed. "They might be robots under Wily's control."

"NO!" Crono surprisingly countered. "Let me see the screen!" Protoman tilted the monitor to face the teen warrior. "That's Lucca and Marle, two of my best friends! We took down Lavos!"

"Go on and let them in," Mega Man instructed his brother. "We can trust Crono."

"I still don't fully trust him." Protoman had his doubts.

Mega Man threw up his arms in protest. "Then WHY did he take a direct hit _for_ us?"

Protoman surrendered his argument and let down the shield long enough for the two to enter. Marle dashed ahead of her violet-haired friend, seeming to almost choke Crono with the force of her hug. "Crono!" she cried. "We heard from locals that you were here, but what exactly happened?"

His happy expression became grim instantly at the thought. "Lavos."

Both girls shrieked. "HE'S BACK?"

"No, _HE'S_ dead, one of his spawn survived. Gave me a direct hit, that's why I'm here. Don't worry; I'm fine. I made some new friends here, and they've agreed to help us destroy Lavos's spawn once and for all." Mega Man moved forward to protest, but Light put up his arm like a barrier to block him. Immediately, the blue bomber knew his assistance was required, whether he'd agreed verbally or not. But, since he'd never _seen_ the true form of Lavos, or heck, even heard of him before, he had no clue as to what he was up against.

"Um, I couldn't help but notice you seem to have an interest in science," Light said, approaching Lucca. "I'm Thomas Light, prominent scientist in cybernetics." Lucca shook his hand and smiled, but when her eyes focused on Mega Man with his battle suit still on, they seemed to glaze over.

"Oh WOW!" the violet-haired student of science cried out. "A BIPED, HUMANOID ROBOT! LIGHT, I'M AMAZED!" She inspected the blue bomber's hands, arms, chest plate, and even tapped on his helmet. Had Mega Man been a human, he probably would have been offended at the physical inspection. Because of his bioroid status, he understood her amazement, and was calmer than a person would have been. "IS HE A…I know this might sound crazy…A LIVING MACHINE?"

Light tilted his head in astonishment. "How'd you know?" he wondered out loud.

The initial incredulity seemed to die down slightly. "It looks like he's taking offense to my close inspection of him," she explained. "Since it's way too complicated for a system to run on THAT many variables required for the different moods, he has to be living. Doctor, I simply MUST get a peek at an internal scan of his workings!"

"I…um…well…" Light seemed overwhelmed at the thought of such a thing. "How…many levels would you like to see?"

"ALL OF THEM!"

"Wow, jeez, I really don't think…"

Suddenly, her insistence began to grate on everyone's nerves. "OH PLEASE OH PLEASE OH PLEASE!"

"Lucca, I think that's quite enough," Crono said, trying to calm down his friend. "This man has to put up with me, and that's a big task to do; I'm a pain in the butt once you know me." Roll laughed, but Lucca did not seem affected.

"Aw c'mon!" she countered. "I'm seventeen years old—a ripe time in my life for further scientific study—and here's the chance of a lifetime! I can't help but be giddy!" The punk-haired time traveler rolled his eyes; Lucca's persistence, although one of her distinguishing traits, could become abnormally irritating sometimes. Dr. Light shot Mega Man a "would-you-consider-such-a-thing" look, and the robot seemed to agree, although it didn't appear to be his most definitive priority.

Dr. Wily could not imagine the horror that seemed to be unfolding before him; walking the edge of the forest accidentally created by the meteor impact that had claimed his castle, all he could do was look into the hole where his once-magnificent fortress had stood. Looking around, the one thought plaguing his mind was why the blast hadn't taken out the city (and Mega Man) with his castle. All he'd wanted was to take over the world, and that required his technology! Now that he'd been effectively disarmed, what was keeping the populace from immediately storming the crater and taking him prisoner? Immediately, thoughts of going into hiding swarmed to the front, but being the intelligent person he was he figured that inevitably he'd be found and captured (and ultimately, incarcerated) just like before.

_Wily,_ a booming voice echoed inside the devious doctor's mind. He wanted to dismiss it, but…

_WILY!_

He whipped his head around left and right. "Who's there!" he yelled. "What is it you want?"

_It's more about what _WE_ both want, Wily,_ the voice immediately responded. _I could destroy you—as well as this entire pathetic world—in mere moments, and no force in existence would be capable of stopping me. But then again, alliances can be more useful than me simply eradicating you._

"Who are you?" he fired off. With the tone of the stranger beginning to appeal to him more and more, he eased his tone of voice.

_My name is Lavos the Second. My father found himself killed…killed by a certain human that I'd like to get revenge upon. Name of Crono, about five foot eight, maybe a hundred eighty pounds, unmistakable orangish-red punk hairdo._

"Wow," admitted Wily. "You remember that much?"

Suddenly, the stranger seemed affected by the memory. _The image of his face is tattooed on my memory. His final strike—the supreme lightning spell Luminaire—destroying my father and forever revitalizing time from his effects on it. Could have just DIED off like the rest of his kind, but NO…had to go and play hero and save the world and KILL MY FATHER!_

Wily almost wanted to leave. "Alright, I've heard your story, and know you could annihilate me in a moment, but what do _you_ have to offer _me_?"

_Imagine your most inhumanly powerful adversary…_ At the suggestion, Wily instinctively thought of Mega Man. _Now, imagine him being perfectly healthy, at his utmost power. _Wily shook his head; where was this stranger going with this?_ Finally, imagine _YOU_, delivering a single blow, SO devastating, that his entire body would get reduced to ash in a mere moment. Ash, from being perfectly healthy._ Wily grinned an evil grin; that indeed was a useful thing to offer.

"Well, Lavos," Wily exclaimed, his evil facial expression remaining the same, "I think you've got yourself an offer."

CHAPTER THREE – Lucca the Great

Protoman pulled his brother aside. "Mega Man," he interrogated the blue bomber, "I can understand Dr. Light inspecting your inner systems. But a stranger we _don't even know!_ You must've blown a ROM board or something if you want to take that risk." Honestly, the red raider simply couldn't imagine a perfect stranger taking even the slightest of peeks at the innermost workings of one of the planet's only hopes at keeping the populace safe. Such an idea, to him, was like playing Russian roulette; the chance of being permanently destroyed was simply too great. He'd rather die than see his brother being potentially manipulated by anyone, period.

"Protoman," his brother replied, "I'm not exactly _jumping_ for joy at the concept of someone I don't intensely know getting a scan of my internal systems, but then again, if we're supposed to defeat Wily, and hopefully, this 'Lavos,' the only way is through _complete_ trust. There's no other way. And besides, Dr. Light has ways of getting a detailed scan of my inner systems on multiple levels _without_ having to open up my panels. Right, doctor?" He looked to his creator.

"Certainly," the white-haired scientist assured Protoman. "It's called…"

Lucca cut him off with, "An MES, or, Multi-layered Electromagnetic Scan." Light looked with astonishment at the girl; she appeared to know as much about science as he did. Protoman, however, viewed her amazing display of scientific terminology as a further reason not to trust her. He put a threatening hand on her left shoulder, squeezing slightly.

"If I get the SLIGHTEST inclination that you're doing something abnormal…"

"Let go of me," she insisted.

"I don't trust you with my brother! Why should I?"

She pulled from her side a rather unruly-looking handheld gun, and pointed it at Protoman's face.

"I may be a petite lady," she warned, "but I am NOT helpless. Now let go of me. This pistol is called my 'WonderShot;' it uses Sun Stone fragments for power and has been known to instantly pulverize titanium." As he let go, she replaced the gun at her side. With the tone calming down, Dr. Light turned to his blue robot.

"Mega Man? Are you ready? If we're gonna go through with this I'd rather get it done right away."

Mega Man shrugged. "I don't see why not. Tell me, Miss Lucca, what do you hope to get out of this?"

"If I can get a look close enough to your innermost energy pool, I can maybe figure out exactly what it is that gives you that 'living' quality." The responses were different for each member. Protoman trusted her less than he did before, Mega Man actually found himself wanting to know that information too, and Doctor Light seemed flabbergasted; even _he_ couldn't decode what the scans had told him. Could a young girl really figure out the secret of life, in terms of a short, blue robot?

Dr. Light walked lockstep with his trusty little bioroid, on their way out of the guest room Crono had awoken in, and into the main room where the equipment was set up. Light had constructed a MES station that was an add-on to the additional system, but only because he wanted to have a tool for spotting energy diseases prematurely, before they presented a problem in curing. The use of it to determine the quality of life itself seemed at least, a step beyond what he'd been used to. "So," Crono began, trying to get more info on the equipment to be used. "What is this 'Multi-layered Electromagnetic' thing?"

Lucca saw Dr. Light about to begin his talk, so she spoke up before he had the chance. She had to show off her scientific talent, as the punk-haired warrior had so gotten accustomed to. "The MES is a device that emits a beam of electromagnetic particles of lesser power than traditional, so as not to fry computer systems," she thoroughly explained. "It reacts with the existing computer transmissions, and returns a much more precise scan than any typical system scanner."

The process also was inhumanly quick: all Mega Man had to do was sit up on the metal examining table, stay perfectly still for about two and a half minutes, and then he was done. The printer gave a ten-page report on the innermost workings of the robot. Lucca didn't hesitate to snatch them up and begin studying them. "It seems that his very energy emissions are different than those of a normal android," she said. "He's emitting an…aura." She hesitated to say those words.

Light stared at the same page she was on, with no avail. "What do you mean?"

She pointed to a strange fuzzy area around the edges of his outermost surface. "The reason it's fuzzy is because he has a living aura. Robots are dead and have no aura. Humans emit an aura that makes the edges of a MES scan of a living person seem blurry or fuzzy. He definitely has an aura." Mega Man himself stared in disbelief as she displayed the results in front of him. Taking a closer look, he couldn't help but chime in with an observation he happened to make.

"It…it's so blurry near the center of my abdomen that you can hardly see it! What does that mean for me!" Flipping the page for an even closer look at his innermost energy pool, she noticed what he'd seen. Her eyes instantaneously widened by what seemed to be a full measure.

"You…_have a soul! A genuine living soul?_" She and the bioroid exchanged incredulous glances. Mega Man found himself short of breath.

Dr. Wily managed to climb down a ways into the crater so as to get closer to his latest ally in crime, Lavos the second. Climbing the almost sheer walls of the crater proved a daunting task, and he wished he had amazing falling ability like his arch-nemesis. _Wily_, a familiar, evil voice beckoned in his mind. Apparently, criminals did support each other. _Just stay there._ Within a few moments, a rumbling sound was heard as a huge, spiky meteor arose from deep within the Earth, and lifted the hapless scientist out of the crater, dumping him on the solid ground. He looked up and saw the mouth-like opening of the meteor swing wide open and pull him inside with a single white light emission. When it died down, he found himself in a cave-like tunnel within the space rock. _Welcome, Wily. This is my means of transportation and my greatest weapon outside of magic. Come inside the main chamber._ Nervously, the elderly scientist approached a brightly-lit chamber that seemed to be the very center of the meteor. In it, a creature no less than nine and a half feet tall rested inside a twenty-foot-tall outer body-like shell that had two arms and a head of its own, and was connected by numerous, large tubes that looked like pipes.

"WELCOME TO MY INNER CHAMBER, DOCTOR WILY," the overwhelming voice of Lavos roared. If the mind-voice was loud, the physical voice was ten times as such. "FROM WHAT I'VE READ INSIDE YOUR MIND, YOU'RE A GREAT SCIENTIST IN THE FIELD OF CYBERNETICS."

"Well," Wily explained in a falsely humble tone. In actuality, he enjoyed the bragging as much as possible. "I hate to brag, but,"

"I NEED TO HEAR NO MORE, DOCTOR. ALLOW ME TO GIVE YOU A MORE EFFECTIVE WAY OF COMBATTING THIS 'MEGA MAN' WARRIOR," Lavos beckoned, mere moments before waving the gigantic left hand of his body suit at the elderly doctor. A field of strange magical energy surrounded the elderly doctor, manipulating his entire frame at once. He seemed to spin while remaining still, yet he felt no dizziness. Suddenly coming to a stop, he examined himself initially, feeling nothing different.

"Hey!" he argued. "I thought you were going to change me!"

"MY POWER IS NOT YET AT UTMOST CAPACITY. IT WILL TAKE A FEW MOMENTS, BUT DO NOT WORRY; IT WILL BE MUCH MORE THAN SUFFICIENT." Wily crossed his arms impatiently, but in doing so he noticed something unique. The fabric of his clothing felt softer and stronger at the same time, so he looked down at himself.

He was now garbed in a strange, flowing dress of a uniquely magic fabric. Before he could protest this transformation, he further examined his body physically, and in doing so he came across a bizarre set of different qualities about himself, and when he patted his chest, his conclusion—which happened to be true—became solidified in his mind.

He'd been transformed into a woman.

"I can stand being turned into a lot of things," he shouted, a surprising, feminine quality to his normally raspy foice. "But a _woman!_" Lavos seemed to stare a hole through him.

"I HAVE COME ACROSS ONLY ONE SOUL WITHIN MY MEMORY I CAN VIVIDLY REMEMBER THE MAGIC OF: QUEEN ZEAL."

"Queen Zeal?" Wily had heard that name somewhere before.

"SHE WAS THE QUEEN OF THE FORMER ZEAL KINGDOM BEFORE MY FATHER SANK THE FLOATING KINGDOM OF ZEAL INTO THE OCEAN FOREVER," Lavos vividly explained. "WHEN SHE CAME ACROSS HIS POWER, HE USED IT TO CORRUPT HER AND LONG AFTER HER BODY DIED, HER SOUL BECAME HIS SERVANT. I STILL HAVE IT IN MY POSSESSION, AND THUS I'VE USED IT TO EMPOWER YOU."

Queen Zeal of the _Kingdom of Zeal_! He'd heard many legends of the floating kingdom where magic originated and flourished, where the most powerful magic users in the entire universe lived. Also, he'd heard how their mighty civilization had been erased in a single moment. One question came to a front. "So, how powerful was she?"

"HER POWER WAS ENOUGH THAT SHE COULD HAVE WIPED OUT A CITY FROM A SINGLE MAGICAL BLAST. EVEN SO, SHE WAS LIKE A FLEA TO MY FATHER. DO NOT DISPAIR; MEGA MAN—AND CRONO'S FRIENDS—WILL DIE AT YOUR HANDS WITH MY ASSISTANCE. OH, ONE MORE THING; WE MUST SUCCEED WITHIN SEVENTY-TWO HOURS OR YOU WILL REVERT TO NORMAL…AND…MY INTERVENTION WILL BECOME A NECESSITY. IS THIS A PROBLEM!"

"No, mighty Lavos!" he cried. "Why, I'm certain I can do it alone now!" His lie seemed to get the point across. Taking a second look at his new body, he hated being a woman. On the other hand, he could feel the power welling within him. All in all, the benefits outweighed the negatives.

"What're you talking about, 'I have a soul!'" Mega Man argued. "I may be alive, but how is that possible?" He simply did not believe he had a soul unique to him that was alive. He believed his soul existed, but that it would be different than any normal person's soul. He believed that if a living machine has a soul, it is somehow connected to cybernetics. Lucca, however, simply shook her head.

"You see," she plainly explained, "there are two types of souls: magical souls, and natural souls. Natural souls are the kind that all living things get the instant they come into existence. Inanimate objects don't have souls, unless magic enters them. Since all things have some degree of magic within them, you, upon assembly, must have gathered in your core the sum of all the magics contained within your inorganic parts. Tell me," she turned to Doctor Light, "when did he first seem to be 'alive?'"

_Wow,_ Light thought. _What a memory_. He cleared his throat. "Well," he began, "when I first built him, he was an ordinary robot. When Dr. Wily turned evil and decided it would suit him to try to conquer the world, I tried to clone Mega Man in order to have _two_ robots with which to fight Wily. What happened, was that Protoman here, got teleported to some far-off locale, and both he and Mega Man became 'living.'" Lucca pondered this information for a moment, then experienced a sudden burst of inspiration.

"Waitaminute!" she cried, jumbling words together. "I know that it takes quite a bit of power to convert a soul from natural to magical and kill a being," Mega Man rolled his eyes; he remembered that too, "but to transform a magical soul _into a natural one!_" she couldn't actually believe it, despite the fact that it was the only conceivable explanation. She turned to the elderly scientist. "Dr. Light! Where do you keep your spare 'robot-making' parts?"

"Um, down the hall, the seventh door on your left," he directed. "What do you need parts for?"

Before dashing off down the hall, she cried, "To test my theory!"

"I'm gonna take these two, and prepare for the upcoming battle!" Crono shouted, trying to get Lucca to hear, but she already was too far down the hall. Mega Man tugged on the teen's outfit.

"Excuse me, Crono, but where'd you say you were taking us?"

"To the end of time," he explained. "Because look; you guys might be some tough competition against this Wily person, but if you ever hope to take on _Lavos_, you're gonna need some magic."

CHAPTER FOUR – The Cheerful, Surprisingly Wise, Playful God of War

It only was a couple minutes' walk to near the crater site where the meteor had impacted. Upon arrival, Crono inspected the ground and when he saw that the rock had been disturbed, he realized Lavos was biding his time, gathering as much power as he possibly could. He shook his head, trying to think of more positive thoughts that the ones coming to the front of his mind. Protoman, who'd been through thick and thin, realized his punk-haired time-traveling friend had some bad memories floating on his conscience.

"What's up?" he asked.

"To think that _this_ is the future," he thought out loud. "When we came here first this place was post-apocalyptic." Mega Man and his brother stopped dead in their tracks.

"What!"

"Lavos attacked the Earth in the year nineteen ninety-nine," Crono explained, recalling his adventure. "In a moment annihilated all governments, all cities, eradicated all opposition, in the time it would take to boil water, everything was gone. When me and my friends Lucca and Marle came here from the year thousand, the landscape was scorched, stripped bare of all vegetation, scattered with broken buildings. The only hope we found was a single ro…bot…" He stopped dead in his tracks. Thinking of what he just recalled, he turned to the little blue robot. "Mega Man! Can you get in touch with Light here and now? I NEED to talk to him!"

Confused, but compliant, Mega Man activated his communicator. "Light!" Crono shouted into it. "I have to ask you a question!"

"Um, okay!" Light replied. The teen's sudden urgency in his voice confused the elderly scientist. "What do you need."

"Prometheus!" Crono yelled. "Does that name mean anything to you?"

"Yeah, it was the first two-legged, upright robot I ever built, _way_ back when I was in college. Why?"

"Oh…my…lord…" Crono whispered. He shook his head. "You have a picture?" Light searched his database for a image file of the robot he'd used for his senior year science project. When he found it, he showed it to Crono. The warrior's eyes got wide instantly. "OH MY GOSH! ROBO!" He couldn't believe what he was staring at. The robot he and his friends had found in the remnants of Proto Dome, had been, in fact, created by Doctor Light sometime during the post-apocalyptic time after Lavos's attack! What had that meant for the future when he was last there? When he and his allies went into the future and met Doan with the surviving humans, and even saved Crono himself from the clutches of death at the top of Death Peak.

"Uh, Crono?" Protoman said, attempting to get his new ally back into the fighting state of mind. "Are you actually going to take us somewhere?" Crono rubbed his forehead, and got back to the task at hand: taking the two small bioroids to see the self-proclaimed Master of War.

"Of…of course," he stammered. "I just wanted to make sure of something. You'll like Spekkio; he really does a lot to teach you the ways of magic." A small blue orb of light, which was a timegate, hovered a few feet above the ground; he took from his pocket the Gate Key that Lucca had created, and touched the tip of the key to the glowing orb, making it instantly expand into an open portal. The two robots seemed initially reluctant to step into the swirling mass of energy, but they inevitably gave in and did so.

Crono had gotten used to the TimeStream; he understood that waves of positive and negative energy represented the entire of the stream of time, and that you always seem to get flipped over and over about a thousand times. Protoman and Mega Man, however, had never before traveled anywhere in time, so they weren't used to the violent flipping about that occurred. They surely thought they were going to do the robot equivalent of vomiting, but before they were completely disoriented, a large black circle in the time stream came upon them quickly, and they found themselves plummeting towards a platform. Had they had enough time to brace for impact, they would have. Instead they came to a landing…a rather soft landing, considering the distance from which they found themselves falling.

"Where...is this place?" Mega Man wondered out loud. The sight seemed strange; a bizarre fog that floated in a sea of empty blackness that extended infinitely in all directions. They were on a series of platforms that were interconnected and stood atop pillars that extended downward as far as the eye could see. Descending a kind of ramp onto the largest of the platforms, they saw a single lamppost emitting light, and a sleeping old man resting against it. Upon hearing their footsteps, the old man awakened.

"Gaspar!" Crono shouted. "Good to see you again!" Shaking the grogginess out of his eyes, Gaspar turned to the punk-haired time traveler and smiled.

"What brings you here again, kid?" Even though he asked, he knew it had to be a negative reason, for Crono had his own life to attend to, and this place was unique as time did not flow here. Therefore no one aged while at this time.

Crono looked down with a grim look. "It's Lavos. His offspring survived and returned to Earth." It was at this point that Mega Man and Protoman stepped forward.

"Who're they?"

"My new friends. They need to see Spekkio."

"Sure! If they're gonna help you take out Lavos, they'll _need_ the magic he gives them."

"Excuse me, Mr. Gaspar," Protoman interrupted, "but where exactly are we?"

Gaspar grinned. "Not _where_, _when_. This is the End of Time. Notice how there's nothing here? That's because this is the one point where all timelines ultimately converge. Similarly, all travelers lost in time wind up here."

"So, anyone who goes through time and gets lost comes here? How do they get back?"

"From this point, you can go anywhere in time you wish! But you may never travel through time in groups larger than three. Otherwise, you just get back here again. Oh, I'm rambling on again! You probably just want to go see Spekkio; he's in the room behind me."

"Great!" Mega Man's enthusiasm was not quite like his brother's. "C'mon brother!"

"Protoman…" he tried to argue, but knew his point was not going to get across. Crono prepared to stop them, for there happened to be one crucial piece of information, but Gaspar lifted a hand to stop him.

"Don't worry, Crono," he whispered. "Let them figure it out."

"So, what's the plan?" Wily said, pacing about inside the inner chambers. Lavos looked down, and noted that his servant was not used completely to the deeper aspects of magic. No matter; he'd get used to it rather quickly. This Dr. Wily obviously had a knack for all things robotic, so it made sense that he should be given something to do that related to his most developed talent. Using his magics, Lavos summoned to their presence a familiar face, one that had been a creation of Wily's, one of his most popular robot masters.

"Bass?" he cried. "What did…" he didn't understand how the robot master had been summoned, but then again, magic was something he hadn't been used to.

"_Bass!_" Mega Man couldn't understand it; they'd walked into the room, and expected a huge, muscular figure to be the Master of War. Neither expected Spekkio to be a black and yellow robot master. They didn't know completely what to expect, but they knew they weren't expecting _this_. Bass held out his arms in welcoming style.

"Hiya!" he said. "You are looking at the one, the only, Master of War himself, SPEKKIO!"

Mega Man, with wide eyes, uttered, "But…why do you look like…"

"Bass?" the figure finished. "It depends. How do I look to you? Strong or weak?"

"No offense, but," Protoman joked, "my brother's beaten Bass numerous times. You look a bit weak." The figure took no offense, but rather, smiled a cheerful grin.

"Ah, I see," he explained. "Let me put it this way. If you're strong, I look strong. If you're weak, I look weak."

"Hmm," Mega Man hummed in frustration. He had only known this Master of War for so long, and already he was being judged.

"But you two," he finished, "are strong of will! That's why the old one let you through." Spekkio, with Bass's form, looked through the two bioroids, directly into their soul. Deciding what magic to give them required getting a better look at what desires lay in their spirit. As soon as he got as good of a peek as he could get, he almost fell over in shock. "W…WOW!" he shouted. " A pair of living, breathing, magical storage units! I'm impressed!"

Protoman blinked. "E…Excuse me?"

"Magical storage units…?" his brother finished.

"You see, Mega and Protoman, you two both started out as just two hunks of metal and wiring. However, since all objects, living or dead, have some magic in them, the magic contained in all your non-living parts came together in the center of you two when you were assembled. The short-circuiting of the cloning device gave the necessary jolt to transform your magical souls into natural, immortal ones. That means that if you ever are to die—not go back to a normal robot, I mean literally be destroyed—you'll go to the beginning of time, like all people do when they take their final rest. And then they are reincarnated." His drawn-out explanation took the two of them by complete surprise. Spekkio waved his Bass-hands at them, and with a cry of "Ipso, facto, meeny moe, MAGICO!" the two brothers found themselves surrounded utterly by magical energy. For Protoman, the energy soon took the form of a dark, shadowy mist-like field. It surrounded him and then entered into him. He expected to feel evil, but did not. Rather, he felt as though the magic itself wanted to be his ally and servant, much unlike the other black magic that entered into Mega Man a while back. His brother, Mega Man, became engulfed in a bright, white field of fog, just the exact opposite color of the dark mist around his brother. He felt his spirits rise, as well as his power, and taking a glance at his energy meter, it had a white glow around it.

"Since you two seem to be somewhat opposites in terms of spirit, I'm giving the red one dark, shadow magic, and the blue one white, spiritual magic. Now, flowing with magic, you want some practice?" Mega Man and Protoman formed arm cannons where their hands had been.

With a grin on their faces, they gave the same answer in unison.

"Bring it on!"

Wily had taken it upon himself—despite his being transformed into a woman, he considered his spirit to be male—to inspect the newly-summoned Bass. He'd been going about looking inside the robot's inner workings as best he could without his computer equipment, and came to several realizations at once. First of all, this form of Bass had no personality program. Two, he was a great deal more powerful. It was, however, the third realization that struck Wily with great surprise.

This Bass was a bioroid. A living machine just like Mega Man. Suddenly, thoughts of fighting fire with fire caused Wily to perk up. However, one problem plagued the scientist's mind.

"Lavos!" Wily yelled. "This Bass you summoned has no innermost energy pool!"

"I DON'T NEED IT, HUMAN," the alien parasite announced. "I WILL PUT MY CONSCIOUSNESS INTO THIS ROBOT, AS WELL AS LINKING HIM TO MY INNERMOST MAGIC RESERVE."

"But…why fight alongside me?"

"BECAUSE I DON'T TRUST YOU ALONE."

Mega Man and Protoman had been on the offensive for the better part of two minutes, but hastily realized their strategy of firing did not work on Spekkio. Their traditional shots went straight through him without touching him at all. "I think," Protoman joked, "this is as close to invincible as Bass is ever going to get." The blue bomber couldn't help but laugh at his brother's joke.

"Your ordinary physical attacks mean nothing to me," Spekkio reminded. "You MUST use magic or you cannot defeat the Master of War."

The two robots took to their new strategy of linking their magical energies to their firing systems, and shooting light and dark beams of magic instead of their usual plasma shots. They knew it to be the only way to win the round of training with Spekkio, but even with their abilities, the Master of War seemed incredibly fast. He dodged the first of their attacks very quickly, and hastily retaliated with fury they were not expecting. Spekkio formed his arm into an arm cannon, and let out a screw-like pulsating beam of shadowy energy from it, taking Mega Man almost by surprise, and blasting a huge hole in the midsection of Protoman. Seeing his brother staggering, leaking energy from a gaping hole, the blue bomber gritted his teeth; this Spekkio was going down.

"Your mind is now clouded by rage!" the Master of War noticed. "No battle is won by a mind that is not clear!"

"You're trying to kill us!" was the response he got. "I don't hold back in life-or-death situations!" Along with his fiery answer, the short blue robot dodged three separate attacks from the attacking Spekkio, much to the War Master's amazement. However, he did manage to take a vicious stream of light emitting from the arm cannon of his blue opponent, which threw him off his feet. He got up just in time to be pelted again with a different light magic technique. Angry, Spekkio put a good chunk of his magical power into his cannon and aimed. Mega Man intended to leap towards his opponent and land in front of him to deliver a magical attack. He didn't get close enough.

"eeeEEEYAHHHH!" Mega Man screamed, as the gigantic burst of light came from the Master of War's arm cannon. He literally felt his body melting into nothing as he was thrown against the far back wall. The encroaching darkness descended upon his vision hastily; he didn't have time to even pray as death closed in…

"He heee!" a voice chuckled playfully, awaking him. Looking around, and inspecting himself, Mega Man found two things to be abnormal. Firstly, not only was he alive, he hadn't been harmed. Secondly, Protoman's hole was gone. "I win! Anytime you want to practice, remember me! I'm the Master of War!"

They both felt rather pitiful as they exited Spekkio's chamber, a grin of victory on the War God's face. It didn't help when Crono chimed in at the precise moment to irritate them the most with, "Let me guess; you got your butts kicked, right?"

"How'd you…?"

"Everyone loses the first time," Crono replied, grinning. "Anyway, let's go back to your time. We need to make sure nothing strange is going on." Mega Man agreed; if Wily was given enough time to do _anything_, he would. The shorter amount of time he had to enact whatever plan he had, the better. Armed with weapons of a different sort than the two bioroids were used to, they followed Crono up the ramp and through the time gate back to the time that they'd just recently left. The flipping through time, Protoman thought, would never be something to get used to.

What they saw when they arrived was not what they'd wanted to see; in the short period of time they'd been gone, the attack phase of Lavos's plan was underway! It was the sight of the person floating in midair just in front of the meteor Lavos rode in, that surprised the punk-haired time warrior the most. Any of the servants Lavos could merely summon would have been understandable, but the woman garbed in royal attire and with flowing deep blue hair came as a shock. "ZEAL!" he shouted. "We defeated her! She was _supposed_ to have become normal again!"

Mega Man looked at the woman, then to his ally. "Crono! What're you talking about?"

Crono stared a hole through the blue bomber. "Queen Zeal's kingdom of the same name was destroyed when Lavos attacked. After which, Lavos used her soul as a puppet. But when we defeated her—and him—she went back to her normal Human self!" It appeared that the woman was having fun destroying parts of the city. With one motion of her finger, a bolt of lightning shot from its tip and struck a building, annihilating it instantly.

"Citizens of Megaland!" Wily shouted. "You will bow before the almighty Lavos, or else you shall be destroyed!" He then began his familiar, menacing laugh.

"Waitaminute," Mega Man realized, "I know that laugh anywhere! That's…_doctor Wily!_"

"No, that's Zeal," Crono countered.

"Well then, Lavos gave Wily her form, because that laugh I've only heard one place. The voice can be different but you can't fool me." Perhaps Crono didn't understand, Mega Man thought, but Wily's laugh was unmistakable regardless of the outer appearance. He remembered it to be that way from the time his body had accidentally become a new shell for the devious doctor to escape from prison. Such things were burned into his mind forever.

"I hate to point out the obvious," Protoman entered, "but am I imagining things or is there a whole bunch of Bass clones destroying the city!" Mega Man almost leaped when his gaze swept from Wily—who just happened to have the body of an extraordinarily powerful sorceress—to the Lavos-controlled Bass clones, led by one particular unit that kept hovering over to different parts of the city, mentally projecting directives into the minds of his servants.

"Who is THAT particular robot?" Crono asked, pointing to the Bass clone hovering in the air, who was making sure his servant clones were doing as he wanted.

"That's Bass," the red raider said with an angry squint. "Wily created him. Apparently, Lavos upgraded him."

Crono surrounded himself and his two compatriots in a hastily-constructed sphere of lightning, and flew over to the point in the sky where the primary Bass unit hovered. "I don't know who you are," Crono shouted at the android, "but if you serve Lavos, we're taking you down!"

A familiar voice came out of the mouth of the primary Bass unit. "Well now," Lavos said, his voice slightly less booming out in the open. "I've been waiting a _LONG TIME _for this moment."

Crono squinted in anger, focusing his mind solely on the foe in front of him. He let the energy from the orb reenter his body, preparing to charge himself up for the upcoming battle. He did, however, keep a thin layer of lightning on the soles of his boots to keep himself in the air. Mega Man and Protoman, quickly realizing their means of hovering in air were gone, used their respective light and dark magics as an envelope-like aura, making themselves remain suspended in the air.

"Mega Man? Are we flying?" Protoman asked.

"Flying _this_ way is new for me too," his brother replied.

"You guys take on Wily!" Crono shouted, turning his head away from Lavos for only a moment. "I'll take on Lavos here!" He hastily drew his katana.

"Oh, you're so sure?" Lavos joked, an arrogant half-grin forming on the Bass clone's face. In response, he formed a similar sword as Crono's out of shadow magic. Within a few moments, the two bioroids took off to face Wily, although neither of them knew exactly how powerful he'd become since acquiring the body of Zeal. The first exchange of swordplay in the airborne fight between Lavos in Bass's body and Crono was on the part of Lavos, who managed to almost catch his foe by surprise. His speed was greater than that of his father's, so it would only be a short period of time before he took the lead.

"Well, it seems the tables are turned in MY favor this time, Mega Man!" Wily's voice still sounded quite strange, since the blue bomber wasn't used to a woman's voice—or body for that matter—having Wily's qualities behind it. Protoman wasn't one for fighting women, but he forced himself to imagine that underneath that navy blue hair and feminine face was the soul of an evil doctor who was bent on taking over the world.

"It looks to me like you discovered your feminine side, Wily!" Protoman joked. In response, the doctor hurled a bolt of lightning at the red raider's feet, causing him to move hastily out of the way.

"Having to cover this womanly body with this dress," Wily explained, gathering fire in one hand and ice crystals in the other, "is a small price to pay for having magical power beyond my wildest imagination!" He threw the ice chunk at Mega Man, who nimbly dodged it, and the fire ball at Protoman, who didn't have time and took it head on, throwing up a shadow magic shield at the last moment, causing himself only minor damage. The blue bomber tried his tried-and-true plasma shots on the devious doctor, hoping it still did some damage. Wily threw up his right forearm in the path of the shot, and when it struck the doctor's arm, the energy crackled and dissolved without leaving a scratch. Mega Man was so stunned he almost took a blast of power head on, had Protoman not thrust him out of the way with a shadow burst.

"Focus!" he shouted to Mega Man. "Focus!"

"Yeah," Mega Man uttered. "Gotcha."

Crono half-raised, half-flung his katana up into the path of Lavos's own sword slash, the two blows canceling each other out as the two warriors applied pressure against each other. When the punk-haired time warrior saw his opponent moving one hand off of the energy sword, he moved his body to the left to dodge a burst of fire from Lavos's palm. The distraction was just enough for the alien parasite to remove his sword from the stalemate of pressures and slash Crono across the gut. It wasn't a particularly deep wound, just a superficial cut, for the warrior had enough time to partially move himself backwards, but stomach slashes, whether severe or not, tended to bleed more than other areas. He then barely had time to duck beneath a predominantly vicious slash. He made a habit of predicting his foe's moves, for Crono himself was an expert at swordplay, and it began to frustrate his foe.

"STAND STILL!"

Crono grinned. "You actually think I'm gonna _LET you win!_ You must be more cracked than I expected!" When Lavos faltered and missed a forward thrust, it was just enough of a miss for Crono to begin his own offensive. The first move of Crono's offensive was to do exactly what Lavos had done to him earlier: to swing at his foe, except for it to be meant as a distraction. The alien parasite obviously did not learn from his mistakes the same way his father did, so it worked to the advantage of the time warrior as he was able to blast him with a powerful lightning spell to the gut, causing the borrowed body of Bass to smash into (and ultimately through) a high-rise building. Before the alien could even slam into the ground, though, Crono already had zoomed down into the trajectory of Lavos's form, and raised his katana.

"Let it be known!" Lavos shouted. "Destroying THIS body does not kill me!"

"I wouldn't have it any other way," Crono replied. Then he promptly slashed the primary Bass clone into a thousand bits.

Mega Man and Protoman weren't having such luck. Although the red raider had gotten in a few hits or so, and his brother was doing great as a distraction/co-attacker, the seemingly endless reserve of power streaming into Wily by means of Lavos's living meteor/spaceship allowed him to instantly regenerate almost any type of damage delivered.

"Mega Man!" Protoman cried, in between dodging Wily's bursts of energy and returning fire. "I don't know how much longer we can keep on the defensive and keep intact!"

"I know," his brother shot back, moments before ducking beneath a fiery stream of magic. "This is just a battle we can't win; we have to take out Lavos. That should eliminate Wily's 'endless supply' of power."

"Ha ha HAHAHA…Oof!" A rather large block of ice sailing in out of nowhere struck Wily directly in his back, throwing him into a nearby building. The trio of Crono, Mega Man and Protoman each turned to the source of the strike. What they saw were two familiar faces that decided to join the action. One was hovering on a disc of ice, the other on a disc of fire.

"Lucca! Marle!" Mega Man shouted. "You defeated Wily?"

"He's not down and out yet," the blonde-haired Marle warned. "Let's take care of Lavos before he gets back up."

"First, let's take care of these Bass clones!" Lucca shouted. She extended both arms as far as they'd go. "FLARE!" she shouted. Several dozen small fireballs converged on a single point at the center of the city. When they all combined, a small series of tiny explosions gave way to a massive discharge of fire that exploded with nuclear warhead-like fury in every direction, obliterating all the clones of Bass but damaging nothing else.

Neither of the two robots could speak as they looked at the remains of the incinerated Bass clones scattered about the city, which itself looked as though the giant blast of fire had not happened at all. Even the frightened populous had been spared death.

"Wow," Protoman uttered.

"That's an understatement," he heard his brother mouth.

"Okay, enough gawking! We have to keep moving!" They instantly snapped out of it and followed their allies up to the meteor hovering in the air.

CHAPTER FIVE - Internal Struggle

"SO," an evil voice boomed from deep within the meteor. "MY FATHER'S MURDERERS HAVE COME TO MEET THEIR DOOM? COME INSIDE; I WANT TO FIGHT YOU FACE TO FACE." All of the brave defenders of time present, from Crono all the way to Lucca and the two robots, entered as the mouth-like opening to the meteor slid open and the way to the inside was revealed. The inner, glowing, cave-like hallways of the meteor were dimly lit by a brilliant light from a far-off innermost chamber. The heroes walked their way into the presence of the evil himself, Lavos. The gigantic shell body that Lavos lived in to control his meteor seemed armed to the teeth, even to someone like Mega Man who'd seen very powerful weaponry before. "HAVE YOU PREPARED FOR OBLIVION?" With his last sentence before beginning the action, the hands of Lavos's battle body swung at the heroes, them just barely missing it.

"The arms first!" Crono shouted. "Then the head!" He and his allies drew their weaponry and began their assault. Marle and Lucca focused the brunt of their attacks on the chest and head as the two bioroids worked the arms down. Rapidly moving blades shot from holes in the palms of the battle suit's hands came much to the dismay of everyone who had to dodge them, and often the arms would swing at them. They seemed to be doing fine—that is, until the chest plates of the battle suit opened up and beams of unimaginably hot light emitted from it, draining significant chunks of life force off all warriors. It was after Mega Man screamed in sheer agony that he noticed something horrific.

"My…my outer metal is melting!" he shrieked, trying his absolute best to keep the firing and magic slinging going long enough to wear down the giant alien parasite. However, Crono noticed the fiend preparing for a rather nasty attack. He and his friends shielded themselves instantly, as did Mega Man, but Protoman got caught off-guard. A cloud of greenish gas came from the battle suit of Lavos, and Protoman accidentally took in a deep breath of it. He felt no different, except…

"Ha ha ha…HA HA HA HA!"

Mega Man shot his brother a quick glance, then looked at Crono. "Why's he just standing there, laughing?" the blue bomber asked. Crono saw instantly what the red raider was preparing to do, and threw himself onto Mega Man, causing a plasma shot from Protoman just barely to miss. "PROTOMAN! What are you doing!"

"He's confused…LOOK OUT!" Crono's sudden shouts gave Mega Man enough time to avoid his brother's attacks. "Lavos sometimes does this. He tries to confuse you. Smell that gas and you just stand there while he wins. And sometimes you attack your friends." As Mega Man tried desperately to keep his guard up against two opponents, Protoman's erratic pattern of shooting at him threw the blue robot off enough for his brother to get in just one good shot. It turned out to be one shot too many. "MEGA MAN!" Lavos had been preparing to shoot at the blue robot, but Protoman lobbed one directly in the already partially melted chest plate of his brother. It ripped a jagged hole through the blue robot.

"CRONO!" Lucca shouted. "HE'S DOWN!"

The punk-haired teen yanked from his bag a max potion and threw it to Lucca. "FORCE-FEED HIM THIS!" She did as he requested and poured the blue liquid into the mouth of Mega Man. Even though he didn't have a stomach or esophagus, his wiring didn't reject the substance. In fact, it seemed to brighten his aura, and at the same time, regenerated most of his damage, so the gaping hole was reduced to a puncture wound. Even still, he was leaking energy. Crono fired a series of lightning shots at all the parts of Lavos's battle suit, and barely had time to dodge a blow from the alien. Instead of hitting him, it viciously slammed Protoman against the wall, instantly snapping him out of the trance-like state.

"C…Crono? What's wrong?"

The teen turned to the red robot. "You got confused and _blasted your own brother!_ Now, we gotta keep attacking!"

A Light magic attack from Mega Man blasted the two arms off the battle suit, causing a crack to form in it. Instead of repairing it, Lavos destroyed it, deciding instead to use his true form to attack them. Mega Man got strange vibes from the alien, but before he could say anything, Crono interrupted him.

"I bet you're wondering why you feel like he has the energy signals of all the life forms you know," Crono said, as an offering of knowledge.

"It had crossed my mind," the reply was.

"His father—the _original_ Lavos—is the reason we're all here."

Protoman tilted his head in confusion. "Yeah…that's obvious!"

"No," Marle corrected. "His father's the reason _WE_ are all here."

The eyes of both robots flew open when they realized what was truly meant. "You…" stammered Mega Man, "you mean, Lavos…is the reason…_humanity exists_!"

"All our science," Lucca finished. "All our history and culture. Evolution of mankind _ITSELF_. All of it was controlled over the sixty-five million years since Lavos's father landed on our planet, up until the time we defeated him."

Protoman shook his head; it couldn't be true, he thought. "You can't…possibly be saying…humans were all grown to so that he could get stronger."

"LIKE ANIMALS GROWN TO BE _SLAUGHTERED_!" Lavos boomed, being very tall even in his true form. "NOW SUFFER THE FATE YOU GAVE MY FATHER!"

"This is _OUR_ planet," Mega Man shouted, preparing himself. "NO ONE decides otherwise!" Lavos in his true form took the two robots by surprise. He had a mostly purple face, was about ten feet tall, had a space suit that looked like it was from a bad sci-fi movie, and two enormous hands that looked like flippers. Had he not been emanating one of the most powerful energy fields ever recorded, he would not have been taken seriously, for he looked not at all Human. Crono had fought this fight successfully before with the original Lavos; thus, he believed that there couldn't be much difference between what the strategy was last time and what it should be this time. He saw the two small orbs floating left and right of Lavos, so he knew they were there do the same thing that they did for the first Lavos.

"Mega Man! Protoman!" Crono shouted as he kept his blade steadied at his side. "The left orb is immune to magic. In fact, throwing magic at it will actually _heal_ damage done to it. The one on the far right doesn't take much damage until it lowers its defense."

Protoman didn't understand. "Why would it lower defenses?"

"Because Lavos can't hurl his instant kill spells with his defenses at full power," he explained. "That's why when you see the energy protecting the right orb drop, hurl everything you have at it. Lavos's main body in the center, and the left orb can all be restored to life by the right one. Once we kill the right orb, Lavos is history."

The powerful alien parasite lifted an arm, signaling the beginning of the battle by showering where the good guys were standing with lightning. Before the battle could seriously get underway, reality itself seemed to bend, as wavy green light was all they could see in all directions as Lavos manipulated time itself.

"Watch out for these time warps!" Lucca warned. "He can use abilities of the past on himself to attack!" Mega Man could not believe what he saw behind Lavos; although it was wavy, he saw a still image of when he had been remotely controlled by Wily! A second later, Lavos opened his mouth and emitted a rather nasty sounding screech. All clamped down on their ears, but Mega Man and his brother turned and began firing on Crono and his friends.

"Mega Man…HEY! We're on the same side! HEY!" he barely dodged two very powerful shots from the blue bomber. He didn't understand it, but somehow the robot was being controlled. Lucca drew her WonderShot and fired off a shot, nailing the left orb in its critical zone, doing a good amount of damage to it, effectively forcing Lavos to perform another time warp in order to recuperate. When he did so, the two robots went back to attacking the real enemy. The problem was, the time warp left behind an image of something neither robot wanted _ever_ to experience again.

"Oh no! Not those ice fighters!"

"What!" Crono wasn't knowledgeable on Mega Man's past enemies, so he knew nothing of what the blue bomber was talking about. He did learn very quickly, though, as he dodged several icy blasts from Lavos.

"No you don't Lavos!" Marle shouted, taking an ice blast head on and merging it with her own attacks. "That's _MY_ specialty!" Lavos, after taking a blow head-on from a huge block of ice, found out that the blonde-haired princess of Guardia was immune to ice. As such, he prepared to do another time warp.

"NOT THIS TIME!" Crono leaped at the main body of Lavos, slashing viciously at his neck. Instead of decapitating him, the attack caused Lavos's main body simply to dematerialize. After he did so, the orbs began their x-shaped flight attack towards the heroes. Everyone ducked, but Protoman and Lucca weren't fast enough. The red raider knew that Lucca was a human and thus could not take the damage he could; he hurled himself in the way, and almost got blown apart.

"PROTOMAN!"

"I'm fine, brother, I'm fine, just kill Lavos!"

Crono saw four small spheres of light exit the orb on the right. "DEFENSES ARE DOWN! KILL THE RIGHT ORB NOW!" The main Lavos body returned from the dead, and lifted his arm for his most powerful instant kill spell. Crono knew if they didn't attack at once, they all were going to perish.

It seemed to go in slow motion: Crono drew his blade and swung, Lucca fired a shot from her gun, Marle blasted the orb with her crossbow, and the two robots fired at the orb, all of the attacks going down at the same time. It all was over when the orb exploded…or was it?

Crono's eyes became as wide as saucers. "WHAT! B…BUT THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE!"

"HEH HEH," Lavos cackled. "YOU EXPECTED _ME_ TO MAKE MY FATHER'S MISTAKE! C'MON! YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO LEARN FROM THE PAST!" Almost all of them were too shocked to react, when Lavos lowered his arm and fired a white-hot beam of energy. Even if they had reacted, they had nowhere near enough time to dodge.

"NOOOOOO!" Crono snapped out of his shock when a blue figure screamed and leaped in front of him. Lucca motioned a hand to push him away, but it was too late. Mega Man had taken the blast full force, all at once. "AAAAAAAAaaaaaaaahhhhhh!" One piercing scream, and his entire body seemed to melt away in a flash.

"MEGA MAAAAANNNN!" Protoman's cry came out like a plea for dear existence, but unfortunately, it was too late. Crono clenched his fists and his teeth in anger.

"I've seen enough…"

Lavos let out a chuckle. "Giving up?"

"NEVER! I'VE SEEN ENOUGH PEOPLE KILLED BY YOU AND YOUR FATHER FOR THE REST OF TIME TO SUFFER! NO MORE! _LUMINAIRE!_" Lavos could not believe what he was seeing; three familiar laser-thin beams of lightning came out of a focal point in between Crono's raised arms, and when they died down, a huge dome of lightning exploded outward, consuming everything outside it. Lavos and his two orbs had nowhere to hide, and thus, were instantly incinerated into nothing.

As the meteor came down to the ground, four faces wore a glum expression. In the struggle to eliminate the single greatest threat to time that ever existed, one of their own had fallen in the line of combat. Protoman had little to say. "I…I don't…"

"It's okay, Protoman," Marle replied. "It hurts to lose a loved one."

"I just…I just…" he stammered.

"Let me guess, you never got to say goodbye?" All present turned to see who had said that last statement. "Hi everyone."

Protoman's jaw dropped. "MEGA MAN! You're alive!" He wrapped his arms around his brother.

"Let's just say someone took pity on me."

"Who?"

Mega Man pointed behind him. "Him."

_Me_, a voice that seemed to come from every direction mentally projected. _I'm one of the meteors that live. My master, Lavos, used me to take over countless worlds. Now that he is gone, I figured I'd do you all a favor and restore your friend. You see, his power comes not from _him,_ but from me._

Mega Man shook Crono's hand. "So, back to your own time, then?"

Lucca took the printout of Mega Man's internal scan, winked at the blue bomber, and replaced it into her pocket. "Thanks for the schematics!" she cheered. "I can work on my very _own_ bioroid now!"

The trio from the past smiled and cheered and exited the meteor to go back to their own time.

"Ow ow OW! QUIT HITTING ME!" Wily shouted. He found he'd been restored to his normal male self, but as soon as he did, the blue-haired woman whose form had been given to him, had been restored to life. He chalked it up to a side effect of Lavos's demise.

"How DARE you use _MY_ body for anything!" Zeal shouted, chasing Wily down as she hurled lightning bolts at him. "I am Queen Zeal! NO ONE but NO ONE messes with _my_ body!" Crono and his friends smiled as they headed towards the time gate.

"Should we go get Zeal and bring her back to her rightful time?" Marle wondered.

Crono smiled as he watched Wily running for his life. "Naw, I think she should have some fun here."

"Let's go home, Protoman," the blue bomber said as he headed for the exit. "Our mission's done, and besides, we gotta track down Wily."

"Be there in a minute, bro! I think I lost my shield back there in the main chamber." He remembered dropping his shield during the fight, so he wandered back into the main chamber. _Ah_! He thought._ There it is!_ When he went to pick it up, a vine-like wire stretched out of one of the walls and attached itself to a wire inside Protoman's neck.

_No! Don't leave! I need a new master!_

"Um, I don't know what to call you, but I have a life here on Earth, and my brother needs me!"

_C'mon! I _NEED _a master!_

Protoman set down his shield as more wires came out of the wall and attached to his body.

"On second thought," he thought out loud, "I always did want to visit space."


End file.
